Most Brits blame climate change for recent heatwave

Matthew SmithHead of Data Journalism
July 31, 2019, 9:52 AM GMT+0

There is widespread acceptance across all social groups that climate change played a role in last week’s record-breaking temperature

Last week Cambridge reached a scorching 38.7C, the hottest temperature ever recorded in the UK. And today the Met Office revealed that the ten hottest years on record have all occurred since 2002.

But do Britons see climate change as the cause of these sizzling conditions, or are they just regarded as a freak occurrence?

New YouGov data reveals that three quarters of Britons believe climate change is at least partly responsible for last week’s sweltering heat. One third of Brits (32%) believe climate change to be fully responsible for the heatwaves, while a further 45% think it is partly responsible.

Only 12% don’t believe climate change to be behind the extreme temperatures, while the remaining 11% don’t know.

That climate change is at least in part responsible for the sizzling temperatures is widely accepted across British society. Liberal Democrat voters and Remain voters are the most likely to attribute it to global warming (both at 88%), while even among the least likely to do so - Leave voters, working class people and Northerners – seven in ten people (72% in all three groups) still say climate change is at least partly responsible.

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